Flood map relief in sight for Cape Cod

Under a bill passed last week by the US House of Representatives, many property owners assigned to danger zones under the controversial revisions to the Federal Emergency Management Agency's flood maps would still be required to buy flood insurance, though the increase in rates set to take effect around the same time would not be as sharp as originally expected.

CAPE COD - Under a bill passed last week by the US House of Representatives, many property owners assigned to danger zones under the controversial revisions to the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s flood maps would still be required to buy flood insurance, though the increase in rates set to take effect around the same time would not be as sharp as originally expected.

Congressman William Keating of Massachusetts’ Ninth District, who has led the charge against the validity of the new FEMA maps, says the bill does not represent everything he originally proposed, but will help residents and business owners on the Cape and in other coastal areas. “It was very important to move forward with this compromise,” he says. “It addresses the two big issues that happened at the same time.”

Those two issues—the new FEMA maps, and 2012’s Biggert-Waters Act—would have spelled undue economic hardship for many looking to buy or sell property. “It was a perfect storm,” Keating says. “These two things came together at the same time.” Just as rates were set to rise precipitately, thanks to Biggert-Waters, FEMA’s expanded flood zones placed many more residents of coastal areas in high-insurance zones.

Keating was an early critic of the new FEMA maps, and commissioned a study by scientists at UMass Dartmouth to examine the validity of the expanded flood zones. The resulting report showed that models based on the Pacific Ocean had been applied to the Atlantic, which critics say invalidated FEMA’s redrawn maps. “They came out and basically were quite clear that they were using wrong methodology,” says Keating. “It made the science wrong.”

Fears of skyrocketing insurance rates has already begun to cast a pall over the real estate market in coastal areas, Keating says. “Houses weren’t selling. People couldn’t afford to buy homes. They couldn’t get mortgages.”

The House bill adjusts many of Biggert-Waters’ provisions, placing a hard cap of 18 percent on the amount rates can increase in a given year, and making allowances for grandfathering in older homes. The new guidelines would buy time for FEMA to revisit its maps, using the correct methodology. “During that time, FEMA’s going to be reworking the maps,” Keating says. “This time we’re saying, get it right, and don’t be overly aggressive in doing it.”

Those who suddenly find themselves in flood zones will still see their rates increase, but not to the staggering degree some had foreseen. “In the interim, people aren’t facing skyrocketing rates,” says Keating. “The bill that we have will help people on many fronts.”

Page 2 of 2 - Keating says the House took the unusual step of allowing senators into the process as the bill was finalized. That should help speed things along as the bill makes it way to the senate, which could come at any time. “The good news is, going into it, that the senate was aware and involved with the discussion last week,” says Keating. “I think it’s going to be very soon.”

Also unusual was the wide bipartisan support the measure attracted; the bill passed by a vote of 309 to 91, with a strong coalition of both Republicans and Democrats on board. “It came slowly,” Keating said. “Initially the people in the coastal areas understood, then the people in the river areas started to understand.” With the release of the UMass results, support began to snowball.

Although not the four-year delay in the implementation of the new maps that Keating had originally supported, the compromise bill is a step in the right direction, he says.